


Midwinter Spring

by CopperBeech



Category: Good Omens (TV), Good Omens - Neil Gaiman & Terry Pratchett
Genre: Aziraphale Loves Crowley (Good Omens), Christmas, Christmas Fluff, Crowley Loves Aziraphale (Good Omens), Crowley is a Little Shit (Good Omens), First Kiss, First Time, M/M, No Angst, Sleepy Cuddles, Snow, Snowball Fight, St James's Park (Good Omens), Sweet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-23
Updated: 2020-12-23
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:34:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,838
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28243977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CopperBeech/pseuds/CopperBeech
Summary: Crowley and Aziraphale have been loyal adversaries since the Beginning. The last battle averted, Crowley has one more challenge to offer.“Crowley, you  utter menace – stop that this instant – “ He ducked just in time for a third snowball to miss him and land onPiers Plowman.With a furious miracle he turned it into a spiral of steam, crying “You complete delinquent! This is war – “The grin shining up at him was even wider when he turned back to the window.“You're on,” said the demon. “St. James’ Park? Work out the rules of engagement on the way.”
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Comments: 58
Kudos: 128





	Midwinter Spring

**Author's Note:**

> Yes, I was thinking a bit of Scrooge on Christmas morning in the first scene.

In the days when they were tracking down the Antichrist – it was an inevitable association – Aziraphale had felt a pang of loss at the prospect of never seeing another Christmas morning. He supposed his reasons were not suitably angelic (he was beginning to conclude that he had never really been cut out for his job): it was simply that, more even than Spring, that first promise of returning light spoke to him of rebirth and renewal. In Heaven there are no second chances, but Earth got one with every morning and every revolution around the Sun. It was something the others, Upstairs, had never seemed to understand.

He’d dozed a little in front of the two-bar electric fire in his flat (a bit modern for his tastes, but Crowley had insisted on his miracling the fireplace away entirely). There had been random flurries then, the sort that came and went on Christmas Eve often enough without leaving a trace, falling from a tarnished-silver night sky that reflected the ubiquitous light-fog of London. It made the cup of cocoa at his elbow that much warmer and more welcome

Perhaps it was the rhythmic swish of car tyres in the dusting on Soho’s streets that had soothed him, or the repetitive, comforting dullness of _Piers Plowman,_ but at some point a good part of the night disappeared in a haze, and when he came to himself the sun was already above the rooftops and angling in the window. The shops opposite were transformed and ennobled by a thick coating of sparkling snow, the pavements already trodden but not cleared, the parked cars turned into soft white castings of themselves.

London was rarely so blessed; the Atlantic air currents saw to that. To see it this year, of all years, was like a message from Her that the world was indeed made new, that he and Crowley had done the right thing, that they had a fresh page to start over.

Maybe he’d ring Crowley up and ask him to come round. It wasn't exactly a demon's holiday. But it was the first Christmas Day in centuries that he hadn’t been saddled with Heavenly assignments; it seemed a shame to merely while away a day that humans dedicated to friends and family, when he and Crowley were a little of each. The midwinter festival had meant many things over the centuries, but he’d come to love all the rituals of meeting to defy the night and the dark, to join hands and say _we’ll get through this together –_

A rude pounding broke into his fond muse. Dear, dear, did people not _know_ what day it was? Had commerce truly devoured the modern soul? After a thoughtful second, he put out his tongue in the general direction of below stairs and went to simmer another pot of milk.

_Bang-bang-bang-bang-bang._

Parcel delivery? Who ever would be sending one? And wouldn’t the carriers all be home with their families? He glanced down into the street, but there was no Royal Mail or International Express van. _Bang-bang-bang-bang._ “Oh, honestly,” he huffed, opening the double casement over the street in one quick gesture, “we’re _closed – “_

The snowball hit smack below his bow tie, just hard enough to make him jump.

“You frightful little _vandal,_ what are you – “

“It snowed, angel!”

Crowley’s grin was huge, Crowley’s hair was a flying cloud of red sulphur in the squint-bright sunlight, Crowley’s cheeks were wind-chapped pink under his glinting sunglasses. His hands were stuffed in the pockets of his woollen pea coat, but his collar was open.

“I thought you hated snow,” said the angel, trying to pretend that snowball melt wasn’t trickling down his own chest through the soaked shirtfront. It tickled.

“Snarls up human doings,” said Crowley. “Lots of swearin’, bein’ late, auto prangs. Day’s work done for me every time it happens.”

“You don’t understand, Crowley. They _love_ snow on Christmas.”

“Good thing I’m off the clock, then, en’t it?”

“You must be freezing. Come in.”

“Nah. Put on your warmies and come out while it’s fresh.”

“Well, _I’ve_ seen it before – “

"C'mon, angel. They're sayin' tomorrow'll be like Spring. Get just one day've this." It became abruptly apparent what Crowley meant by _this_ as another snowball grazed his shoulder, landing in front of the two-bar fire and leaving a spoonful of slush to crawl down his collar.

“Crowley, you _utter menace –_ stop that this instant – “ He ducked just in time for a third volley to miss him and land on _Piers Plowman._ With a furious miracle he turned it into a spiral of steam, crying “You complete delinquent! This is _war – “_

The grin shining up at him was even wider when he looked back out the window.

“You're on,” said the demon. “St. James’ Park? Work out the rules of engagement on the way.”

* * *

“All right, no more than ten charges stockpiled before we start.”

“No miracling new ones. Gotta make ‘em all the Human way.”

“”Ten points for a full body hit. Two for a limb. Face out of bounds.”

“What kind of rules are those?”

“Heaven’s. We had to train, you know, Crowley. It was a way of gauging one’s readiness.”

“Hell didn’t have rules like that. Any hit was a good hit.”

“It was _my_ turn to make a rule.”

“All right, all right.”

The steel surface of the pond was dotted with tiny floes and fragments of ice, an apparent matter of indifference to the ducks, who paddled about as if it were a summer day. Occasional passersby seemed, dared he imagine, _miraculously_ unconcerned with the two middle-aged men stacking snowballs in pyramids like cannon shot, each behind a tree, on opposite sides of the slushy footpath.

“Stakes?” said Crowley.

“Are we playing for stakes?”

“Gotta be a wager.”

“Gambling is a vice, Crowley.”

“C’mon, we’ve been wagering ever since I flipped that coin at the Globe.”

“You cheated.”

“Wondered when you’d figure that out.”

Aziraphale said nothing to that, because the answer was _at the exact moment it happened, and your smile was worth it._ It might have been the first real joy he’d seen on Crowley’s face since the Beginning. Out loud, he suggested: “Winner buys the other a drink?”

“Been buyin’ each other drinks for centuries.”

“All right, what then?”

“Let’s say winner chooses a forfeit. Let you guess.”

“Very well. I’ll have you know I’ve never given way in a fight.”

“Not with a plate of crepes in any event. Don’t be stroppy, the look flatters you.”

“Oh! You _wretch –_ prepare yourself to feel the strength of my arm. We shall see who would have won had we fought each other.”

“Count down from ten?”

“Arm yourself, sirrah.”

“Fill your hand,” said Crowley, who’d been watching spaghetti Westerns, and counted back to zero.

Aziraphale’s first shot hit the tree that Crowley ducked behind, his second flew wild and knocked a cascade of icy gobbets down from its branches onto the demon’s bare head. The resulting bout of swearing left the angel an opening, and he scored a hit on Crowley’s left elbow, only to take an immediate return strike on the lapel of his camel-hair coat.

“First blood!” shouted the demon, dodging behind the next tree in the line. A delicate dance of gauging sight lines followed, until Crowley released a three-snowball volley, racking up another hit on the angel’s hip and a bare graze to his shoulder.

“Twenty-two to two,” panted Crowley.

“ _Twenty._ I felt no impact.”

“Contact. Like fencin’.”

“Now you’re making up rules as you go – “ Aziraphale ducked just in time.

“All right, two-point handicap. Since you’re clearly out’ve _practice.”_

“I’ll give you _practice – “_ And the battle began in earnest, Aziraphale exhausting his magazine with a flurry of overhand throws that got more accurate and forceful as he went, taking only one strike as he dodged from tree to tree. Crowley took off, carrying his last two charges, and zigzagged towards the water. A hastily compressed snowball arced past him, igniting a flurry of wings as the splash of impact erupted in the middle of the flock. He dropped and rolled, firing twice and missing, scrambling up again to swing around a mossy trunk and reverse direction.

“We’re both disarmed,” puffed Aziraphale. “Yield, varlet. Twenty-point advantage.”

“Not the count I get.”

“I keep a shop. I can do accurate sums.”

“Count this,” said Crowley, taking advantage of the momentary pause to fire a half-molded missile that left a starburst of white on the camel-hair. Another, even more loosely assembled, covered Aziraphale with icy shrapnel.

“You will miracle that dry.”

“Fair deal. Same for mine.”

“Race to that shrubbery,” offered Aziraphale. “We drilled for engagement in motion.”

“Faster’n you.”

“Craftier,” said Aziraphale and pulled a final snowball out of his pocket, a direct hit. Shots went wild and a shower of frozen fragments exploded over Aziraphale’s head as a double-sized projectile punched through the branches and startled a robin. Crowley reached the shrubbery first, stumbled, rolled; came to rest on the unmarked snow and swept his arms in a graceful arc.

“Snow angels! You do one!”

“You are” – _huff – “_ an absolute _marauder,_ Crowley – that last one went down my collar – _aaah!”_ A final snowball, raked up as Crowley plowed his arms through the snow, took him on the hip. “What’s so funny?“

“Should’ve had ’em fight the last battle this way – nail old Gabriel with a snowball – get Hastur right on the frog – _snowballs in Hell_ \-- “

“Hastur’s on your side.” Chunks of snow shook out of the angel’s hair.

“ ‘S’on _their_ side. Y’r on my side.”

“One could be forgiven for doubting that at the moment.”

“Ah, angel, good fun.”

“Get up, you ridiculous thing. You’ll be soaked through – here, truce, I’ll give you a hand up – ”

Aziraphale, for all his warrior bravado, had let the habits of long friendship blind him to a first principle: in an engagement with a demon, never let your guard down. White diamond dust rose to meet him as Crowley reached up and yanked, rolling to blunt the fall, coming to rest after a short tussle with his knees on either side of the angel’s hips.

“Yield. I have the advantage.” Crowley, pink and panting, looked positively boyish, eyes glinting like Baltic amber over his half-dislodged sunglasses. Snow-spangled, soaked hair stuck to his forehead.

“We are tied, shot for shot. And I see no reason why this contest should devolve into an inelegant grapple. Let me rise peaceably and I will forbear to retaliate. You know an angel cannot lie.”

“Nah, just fib a little – “

“I do not _fib – “_

“ _I must’ve mislaid it – “_ Of course he'd been listening, the scapegrace. _  
_

“I’m getting _drenched,_ Crowley. These shoes are soaked through, and it’s not good for the cashmere – “

“Warrior of Heaven, right.“

“Very well, fiend. Name your forfeit. I have an unparalleled cellar and a welcome at every restaurant worth the name. I may even, in the generous spirit of Christmas, part with a book.” This seemed safe ground, as Crowley had yet to show interest in a book.

“Not telling. Show you. Eyes shut a moment.”

“If you insist.”

The demon’s lips were cold but his breath was warm. Aziraphale jumped and inhaled sharply, filling his head with the spice-and-scorch scent of Crowley.

The engulfing snow, the frozen ground underneath suddenly seemed remarkably comfortable.

“That’s– “ It felt as if Crowley had left a signature on his lips. “That’s the entire forfeit?”

“Only if you say so,” said Crowley, very close to his ear.

His hair was full of snow, cold and trickling between the angel’s fingers, and this time they opened into each other’s warmth. The thick wet coats were cumbersome.

“It may be possible I owe you for past occasions,” suggested Aziraphale when the kiss broke off. “I seem to remember some. Well. Disputes in which I was wrong, and you were right.”

“Warmer places t’do it. Knees freezing, angel.”

* * *

Perhaps it was just the angle of the sunlight -- refracting off snow-layered hydrants and doorsills and bins, surprising rainbows out of a reflective street sign. If old London had looked reborn that morning, she was beatified now. It might have been more convenient to let go of Crowley’s hand as they navigated crossings, threaded through the growing numbers on the pavements, but it was completely out of the question, even when he turned the key in the lock of A. Z. Fell’s, sidled them both through the doorway, nudged it shut with a foot.

“As to that additional forfeit,” he said, turning into an embrace that began before the latch clicked home.

This, this was what he had wanted for centuries, had he been honest -- the meeting of their well-loved and lived-in Earthly forms; the clumsy, tender, _human_ thing, damp and crude with breath and the exploration of tongues, with the graze of stubble and the mingling scent of one another. He’d put away the thought time and again before it even had a chance to form, there in the shop emptying bottles (maybe that was why they did it), quarreling in the park (what if he’d silenced the bitterness and despair of the demon’s past anger this way, standing in for the words he couldn’t say lest Heaven hear?). When Crowley’s head lifted away for a moment he pulled it back down, _all those years, I have so many forfeits to pay._

“Greedy,” murmured the demon, greedily.

“ _Avaritia_ is a sin.” The words were muffled against Crowley’s cheek. “One of the Seven, in fact. Therefore it cannot be laid against me.”

“And what can?”

“Scamp.” The wool of the peacoat was damp, and resisted his fingers for a moment, until he could slip the buttons and glide his hands against the slight flinch – “ _sss, cold, angel” –_ of piano-key ribs. “Repent of your blaspheming ways.”

“Shan’t.”

“Then you are a wicked, wanton creature, and you _shall_ feel the strength of my arm.”

“Oh, I’m _hoping_.”

The world was remade, and anything was possible.

“Fill your hand,” said Crowley in his ear, softly, teasingly, guiding the track of still-cool fingers down his flank, over the bony ridge of his hip..

“I do believe I shall.”

* * *

“Y’know you _were_ actually ahead, right? It wasn’t a tie.”

Their mostly-dry clothes were spread along the footboard, facing the electric fire – they'd had trouble focusing enough for a proper miracle – and the russet of midwinter's early sunset filled the entire sky, as if Heaven were their hearth now. Crowley was almost submerged in the feather comforter, hair elflocked damp against the ticking-striped pillowslip.

“Not a bit of it. I told you, I can do sums.”

“You fibbed.”

“I told a _conveniently inflected_ truth. I didn’t count the one that only hit your coattail.”

“Hopin’ I’d do that?”

“Do what?” said the angel innocently.

“Forgetful with age, en't you? Need remindin’.”

Crowley reminded him.

“I may have found myself, erm, a trifle curious,” said Aziraphale.

“Enough to yield to a demon in battle. Bad angel.”

“I confess I never seemed entirely suited for it."

They considered forfeits for a while, in the luxury of each other’s warmth.

“I’m glad we never really had to face each other,” said Aziraphale next to Crowley's ear when they paused presently, not wanting to go _too fast_ this time _._

“Thing I was scared’ve most.”

“I would have cast down my sword before I fought you.”

“I know.” When had he first wondered what those long fingers would feel like in his hair? “I’d’ve – dunno. Exploded, or somethin’.”

“You seem quite able to survive that, given the events of the last few hours.”

“Test it again? Make sure, like.”

* * *

“I suppose you were thinking of this the whole time?”

“Not the _whole_ time.”

“So it _was_ a scheme, you scoundrel.”

“Had to do something, angel. Startin’ to wonder if you’d read too many of those four-volume novels, y'know, finally touch hands on page six hundred and six.”

“I wasn’t certain how you felt.”

“Better show you again then.”

* * *

Crowley slept easily. It was the serpent in him, Aziraphale supposed; give him some warmth and he would coil in slumber, as he coiled now, snug against the angel’s body yet languid, boneless. All the archness, all the anger, all the slyness and reserve had faded from the angular face, leaving only the unlined candour that he’d seen just once before, in Eden. _You gave it away?_

He wondered what would have happened if he’d met that astonished frankness in the way he’d fleetingly imagined then ( _put away the thought, lest Heaven hear_ ). The _human_ way, the way he’d seen them do in the Garden.

Never mind. They had a second chance.

_And the end of all our exploring  
_ _Will be to arrive where we started  
_ _And know the place for the first time:  
_ _Through the unknown, unremembered gate  
When the last of earth left to discover  
_ _Is that which was the beginning;  
_ _At the source of the longest river_  
_The voice of the hidden waterfall  
_ _And the children in the apple-tree._

finis

**Author's Note:**

> The title and the lines at the end -- which reminded me forcibly of Eden -- are taken from T. S. Eliot's [Little Gidding](http://www.columbia.edu/itc/history/winter/w3206/edit/tseliotlittlegidding.html), a poem rather too heavy with reflection for this foolish little fic, but expressing some of the same sentiments about midwinter and the promise of renewal.
> 
> A joyous turn of the year to you and yours. Come celebrate the light with me on Tumblr @CopperPlateBeech


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